The Door
by ceridwen-amyed
Summary: The line between reality and fantasy is a blurred one in the Matrix… Is it any different in the real world? For the Kid and Neo, dreams are never as clear-cut as they first seem.


TITLE: The Door

AUTHOR: ceridwen_amyed

SUMMARY: The line between reality and fantasy is a blurred one in the Matrix… Is it any different in the real world? For the Kid and Neo, dreams are never as clear-cut as they first seem.

SPOILERS: The Matrix, Kid's Story (Animatrix)

CATEGORIES: Drama

AUTHOR'S NOTE: _I am the door, and the person who enters through me will be saved and will be able to come in and go out and find pasture._

- John 10:9__

**Prologue**

**How can you tell the difference between the real world and the dream world?**

_Three days after her son's seventh birthday, Michelle Anderson was woken in the middle of the night by a small warm body crawling into her bed._

_"Baby?"___

_"I had a bad dream, ma," said Thomas, burying his head in her pillow. "I was walking to school and I was scared. And then this big truck…" He couldn't continue; the nightmare was still fresh in his mind. The truck was monstrous, like an ogre or troll or dragon, all metal and teeth and when it hit him, he'd felt his bones shatter, his flesh reverberating with impact. Blood on the asphalt._

_He wished Pa was there and not working the late shift. Pa, with his big shoulders, could carry the world and all its troubles, hoisting them away from his son and keeping him safe. Ma put her arms around him and hugged him tightly._

_"S'okay, baby," she said. "It was just a dream. It can't hurt you."_

_"But it did hurt," said Thomas and he began to cry. Michelle Anderson cuddled him and whispered assurances in his ear until they both fell asleep._

_The next night, the same thing happened. And the night after that. For three weeks, Thomas Anderson's nights were filled with fear and darkness. The only place that was safe was his parents' huge bed with the downy comforter that had ducks on it._

_Michelle feared for her son; the world was not a kind place for boys like him, boys who felt everything so intensely and completely. She loved him for it. Every time he showed the latest thing he had built from blocks and pieces of wood, she felt blessed because this boy, her boy, was a shining bright thing. Sometimes she could not quite comprehend him and his beauty. Or his dreams, which now haunted his day._

_Before school every morning he would beg her not to make him go. The way to school meant walking beside and finally crossing a busy road, and every time a big truck rolled its way past, he clung to his book bag and shut his eyes. When he opened them, the trucks were gone and school was just ahead. He allowed himself a sigh of relief and then would run the rest of the way._

_And then one day, almost a month after her son's seventh birthday, Michelle Anderson got a call from the hospital. _We have your son here. He was hit—

_Michelle Anderson didn't need to hear the rest; she hung up the phone, put on her coat and went to the hospital._

_She sat by his bedside, listening to his breathing and staring at the cut on his lip that would surely scar. The nurse explained what had happened, and it was a story Michelle had heard so many times before but not in the calm and even tones of a nurse. As the nurse spoke, she heard her little boy's voice, whispering in her ear, his body curled up fiercely beside her._

It was a truck, ma. A big truck that swerved off the road and it hit me. It hurt, ma.

_Michelle spent the night at her son's bedside, watching him slip in and out of consciousness and wondered if this was punishment for not heeding his dreams. For not believing in him. She fell asleep, confused and wishing that her husband were there, and not working. He would know what to suggest._

_In the ordinary light of the next day, John and Michelle Anderson drank coffee and discussed what had happened._

_"He knew it would happen," said Michelle. "He's been dreaming it for weeks…"_

_"How did he know?"_

_The coffee tasted extra bitter, and Michelle and John took a joint, unsaid decision that is so often made by humans faced by an impossible situation. Denial is the most predictable of all human emotions._

_Could their son be… different?__ Could he see the future? It was too fantastical for this small town, reliant on the road that had nearly killed their son for trade and passing tourists to make money._

_Thomas, they decided, couldn't have known that a truck would hit him. He must have just been experiencing anxiety dreams, no doubt caused by the road. It was, Michelle said, highly dangerous that they should allow their children to walk to school by such a busy road. She set about organising a car pool to get the kids to school, and eventually, raising funds for a school bus._

_When Thomas was awake he told his parents that he had known what was going to happen. He had woken in the morning and knowing that he could not avoid it, he walked to school. He'd only been afraid when he'd seen the truck, a green dragon skidding towards him. It had hurt. But at least, he told his parents, there would be no more dreams._

_His parents nodded and then Pa had explained about anxiety dreams, and how Thomas had just been projecting his fear of the road into his dreams. Thomas tried to protest that it hadn't been a dream; it had never felt like a dream. He'd only called it that because what else did you call what you saw when you were asleep? After a while, Thomas realised his parents couldn't be moved in their opinions and decided to believe them. It was easier that way._

_As he grew older, Thomas learnt to distinguish between his ordinary dreams where he played ice hockey and flew and ate chocolate chip cookies until he was fit to burst, and the dreams that were visions. In the latter, the line between reality and dreams blurred and it didn't matter whether he was awake or still dreaming. It all felt the same._

_The visions thinned out when he left home. The cynicism of what everyone else called the "real world" dulled the brilliance of his dreams until all he saw at night was vague shadows and movements in the dark._

_He was grateful for this, not liking the burden of the future. And then he forgot all about the visions until he met a man named Morpheus._

_"Have you ever had a dream, Neo, that you were so sure was real?"_

**I.**

**From delusion lead me to Truth.**

_He never paid much attention in class. It seemed unimportant somehow, all of it, from physics to English; none of it mattered. His teachers could not understand it. How could a boy who spent all lesson scribbling notes furiously on his paper be failing most of his classes? What they didn't understand was that what he wrote had nothing to do with what they said._

_His thoughts were jumbled together, and he could only make sense of them on the clean white and blue lined paper._

This isn't real,_ he wrote in physics as Miss Casey's chalk scraped __Newton__'s Law of Gravity on the blackboard._The real world lies somewhere else.

_That was the basic truth, he decided. There was something else, something more real than paper and chalk and school. Something he touched briefly, for just a moment when he skated. A knowledge that slipped beyond him into the thin air. _

_There were always men in suits watching him at the skateboarder's park. Some said they were talent scouts, competition organisers, and everyone upped their level to the extreme. Michael watched them watching him and shivered._

_They know, he thought. They know I hack. He tried to stop; every night, he sat in front of his computer and started on his homework. His mother listened to the news downstairs, turning the sound up all the way because her hearing was bad. One day he heard the name Neo. A terrorist, the reporter said, a man who had attacked a government building and rescued another terrorist named Morpheus. No one knew how they had managed it. _

_Michael spent all night searching on the Internet for information on Neo. A man who attacked and vanished, devastating buildings and people before disappearing from view. On the FBI's most wanted list he was pictured wearing sunglasses and a black coat that looked strangely like a cassock. He looked regal and calm, and Michael knew that whatever the answer was, it lay with this man._

_He learned that Neo was a hacker, had been one for years before suddenly emerging as a very real and dangerous entity. The newspapers said that he fought for a cause; a terrible one, one that didn't really exist. One that was only an excuse for the destruction of __America__.___

What is the Matrix?_ asked Michael in internet chat rooms. Nobody knew. All clues lead to dead ends, even in the highest ranking FBI files for Neo and the others he worked with. The cause was the Matrix. But nobody knew what the Matrix was._

_So in desperation, Michael spent his lessons writing on his paper, somehow hoping that the letters would rearrange themselves into answers or that someone would look over his shoulder and know what he was talking about._

_Nobody did, and Michael Karl Popper was Clearview High's joke._

Neo. Morpheus. Trinity.

Get me out of here.

**II.******

**We are near awakening when we dream that we dream.**

The dreams started innocently enough. Falling dreams were familiar to Neo and oddly comforting. He never felt fear in these dreams, just an odd sort of serenity. He was falling and nothing could touch him. Perhaps he would hit the ground, but it was so far off… And there was nothing he could do to stop falling. He imagined that dying like that would feel peaceful because you could do nothing to stop it; it was inevitable.

There was no fear in falling now. All dreams, be they the ones you feel at night when you're asleep or the dream of the Matrix, held no fear for Neo because he was master of them. He could fly in all dreams, whether they were the artificial constructs of machine design or the confused ramblings of his sleeping mind, waiting until the last second before pulling up from the ground.

"You've got serious thrill issues," said Link.

In his dreams, he was falling, cutting the air like a clumsy bullet. It was so vivid he could feel the wind whip at his pant legs, and see the sky beyond his sneakers, their laces whipping to and fro. His legs were bent over his head uncomfortably, but he supposed that was the least of his worries as metal railings cut the air close to his cheeks.

He woke after the impact, feeling the breath slam out of him. His head throbbed.

"You okay?" murmured Trinity against his shoulder.

"Yeah. Did I wake you?"

Trinity muttered something, tightened her grip around his waist and went back to sleep. Neo stared at the wall and remembered. The truck hurtling towards him and there was no escaping it, no getting away from its force. For a moment, death was certain…

"When I was a kid," he said out loud, "I dreamt that I died."

"What?" He felt Trinity shift next to him, her head rising from the pillow.

"I fell…"

"It was just a dream, Neo," said Trinity.

"I know. Felt real."

"They always do," she said.

_Not the way this does,_ thought Neo and he went back to sleep.

The dream did not fade away. Every night it became clearer, more defined. It felt like watching a movie, almost. He switched perspectives, seeing the crows, perched on chain link fences, take off as he started to fall and then seeing his sneakers (had he ever owned sneakers that looked like that?), laces whipping in the breeze. He still felt no fear when falling. Hitting the ground, he thought in the dream, would not mean death. 

"Here's our next recruit," said Trinity a week after the first dream. She pointed at the monitor, at one particular strip of code. "Just turned sixteen last week. Goes by the alias Kid."

"That's original," said Neo. He glanced up at Morpheus. "So, are you going in?"

Morpheus shook his head. "No. But you are."

Neo blinked. "Me?"

Morpheus smiled. "Look more closely, Neo. It's not me he's looking for."

Puzzled, Neo leaned forward, staring at the lines of code. He let his eyes relax like he was watching one of those magic eye pictures, allowing the code to peel away until there was only the shape of a boy, slumped over a computer. A computer that was downloading information on one individual in particular.

"Shit," said Neo, staring at his own face obscured by sunglasses in Matrix code. Link shook his head.

"Don't know why you're so surprised. You can _fly_, man. Bound to attract some attention."

"Make contact with him as soon as you think is right, Neo," said Morpheus.

"But-" 

"Neo. It's you he's looking for. He'll trust you." Morpheus briefly rested a hand on Neo's arm. "I trust you," he said simply. "You'll know what to do."

**III.******

**From darkness lead me to Light.**

I don't know what to do,_ wrote Michael in his journal. _I can't stop it. I don't know if I want to.

_He'd always been a quiet hacker, never wanting to attract too much attention to himself, not the way some hackers liked to. As he started his search for Neo, he hacked into government files. Nobody seemed to pay much attention to him; he slipped in, looked around, digested the information and then moved on. Nobody got hurt and so no authorities noticed._

_One day, Michael found an audio file. Someone had managed to trace a phone line Neo had used. Michael didn't think twice about downloading the file, even though he knew someone would notice. He had to know what Neo sounded like; had to know that he was real. _

"I know you're out there. I can feel you now. I know that you're afraid. You're afraid of us. You're afraid of change."

_The attached text file said that Neo had said more, but somehow the audio link had been screwed with. Michael listened to the file over and over again, until his skull reverberated with Neo's voice. The strength in it, the quiet confidence in that voice hooked him in. The more he listened, the more he felt he understood. Neo was fighting for something, something important and powerful. The government were afraid of him, and Michael thought it was for good reason. Neo wanted revolution, displacement of government._

_The papers were full of stories of war with other countries, but it seemed that another war was constantly being fought. Neo, Morpheus and Trinity were in the front line. Michael listened to Neo's voice and heard his calling. Whatever this war was, he would fight._

**IV.******

**A prison-house of language.******

"I have no idea what to say."

"Just remember what Morpheus said to you," said Trinity, her voice calm and reassuring as ever. "Just think of what you needed to hear and say it to the Kid. It's not as hard as it sounds. Just hook him and reel him in."

"He's not a fish," said Neo. Trinity rolled her eyes.

 "Just remember to keep some slack; you can't tell him everything all at once."

"Why not? It's only fair to warn him."

"He wouldn't understand the truth."

"Yes, he would. 'Hey Kid, this isn't real. Machines have taken over the world and enslaved mankind.' Simple."

"Neo. Be serious."

Neo decided not to tell Trinity that he was being serious. He stared down at his hands.

"I'm just a computer hacker, Trin… I'm not like you or Morpheus. I don't have the words to—I can't-" He sighed. "I just don't know what to say to make him believe me."

"You don't have to." Neo looked up at her and she smiled. "Don't you see?" she said softly. "He already believes in you. Remember how you felt about Morpheus? How you told yourself that he was the answer?" 

Neo nodded, remembering so many nights bathing in the glow of his computer, devouring information, no matter how small or insignificant, on this international terrorist.

"That's how the Kid feels about you."

"No way," said Neo, shaking his head. That was too hard to believe, too fantastic… He could not see himself as a terrorist, although he knew that technically he was. He could not imagine anyone looking at him in the same way he looked at Morpheus. He was not a mentor, or a leader. He was--

"You're the One, Neo," said Trinity, taking his hand in hers. "I'm afraid you'll have to get used to this… hero-worship."

Neo shut his eyes. That was the cold hard truth of it; he was a hero.

"I don't want it."

"But don't you see," said Trinity softly, "that's why you _are_ a hero." He said nothing and she embraced him.

"I need you," he said, voice muffled against her shoulder. "I need you to help me."

"No, you don't," she said. "You can do this." He held her more tightly. "I'll be here for you, Neo, but--"

"I have to do this myself," he finished. "I know." He paused. "Are you sure you can't just, you know… ghost write for me?"

**V.**

**Belief is the bedrock of hope.**

_Every day was the same as the last. Not just in the sense that he always had toast for breakfast, or because he was always only just in time for class. It was something deeper than that; something more akin to déjà vu. _

The same scenes,_ he wrote, _the same people…_ There was nothing much more to say. Every day felt as unreal as the next, as identical as a deck of cards. It felt like there were an finite amount of days and some great power reshuffled them, dealt them out differently every month, tricking them all into thinking that everything was individual, every moment singular and distinctive._

_Michael felt more alive when he dreamt of falling through the air. He felt more alive when he searched for Neo. He wondered if Neo and he were the only real people in the world, the only two things that really existed. Every narrow escape Neo had, every mission (as Michael liked to think of them) was unlike anything he'd ever heard of. Eyewitnesses claimed to have seen Neo smash full grown men through walls before disappearing… Before flying high above the world._

_Michael dreamed that he was flying alongside Neo, but he always fell. Sometimes Neo caught him; other times Michael fell through the air, feeling nothing but an empty sort of peace._

"You're afraid of us. You're afraid of change."

I want change,_ wrote Michael. _I want out of this nightmare.

I'm not afraid.

**VI.******

**The best way to make your dreams come true is to wake up.**

Crows took off from the fence. The building whipped past him, and Neo was sure he'd never owned a pair of sneakers that looked like that.

The telephone's sharp cry woke him. He blinked into the pillow and listened to Trinity swear as she answered the phone.

"Yeah?" she said sleepily. "Neo." She shook his shoulder. "For you." She balanced the phone against his cheek and the pillow.

"What?" said Neo into the mouthpiece, not bothering to raise his hands to grip the receiver.

"Sorry, Neo, but something's come up." Link sounded a little tired, like he'd just woken up fully. "I think you should get down here. It's the Kid."

Neo sighed. "Okay." He sat up and put the phone back on the hook. He glanced around at Trinity who was sitting up, scratching her stomach. She stretched.

"Want me to come with you?"

_Yes_, thought Neo. "No," he said out loud. "This is one of those things I should probably do by myself, right?" Trinity smiled.

"Good luck." She lay back down, pulling the covers over her head. Neo stared at the lumpy bed for a moment before sighing, getting out of bed and pulling on his boots.

The ship was even colder at night than it was during the day. Neo had thought that almost four months of living here would have acclimatised him to it, but he still found himself pulling on two extra sweaters (one of them was Trinity's; he hoped he didn't stretch it out of shape like he had done with the last one) before venturing out into the corridor. The Core seemed colder than his room, although Neo had a feeling this had more to do with its current lack of Trinity than anything else. Neo approached the operator's station.

"Hey."

"Hey," said Link, rubbing his eyes. "Sorry to wake you and all, but Kid just switched on his computer. I thought you might want to make contact." He gave Neo an apologetic smile. Neo yawned.

"Why not?" he said. It was only when he'd jacked in and was standing in a small hotel room containing only a laptop that he realised that he still had no idea what to say to the Kid.

_Just relax,_ he thought absently, keying in the commands that Trinity had shown him. _You could recite the lyrics to the Spam song to him and he'd be happy. _Somehow, this thought did not make Neo feel any better.

A green curser flickered in the top left hand corner of the screen for a few moments. Neo wondered briefly if he should say "hello" or something, just to let the Kid know that there was someone there. The curser flickered again and then started moving across the screen.

**Somebody tell me.**

**Why does it feel more real when I dream than when I am awake?**

**How can I know if my senses are lying to me?**

Neo stared blankly at the screen. Typing **The**** Matrix has you** didn't seem particularly fitting. Okay. So, what would Morpheus do? Type something deep and mystifying that wasn't really an answer and yet wasn't exactly not an answer. Neo thought very hard for a moment and then typed hesitantly.

**There is some fiction in your truth,**

**and**** some truth in your fiction.**

He nodded to himself. Okay. That wasn't so bad. He had a feeling he'd probably stolen and/or mutilated a famous quote, but that was alright. It would do. The Kid hadn't typed anything in reply or tried to restart the computer like Neo had done. Wondering if it was possible to have an awkward silence in cyberspace, Neo wrote what he considered to be a fair warning.

**To know the truth, you must risk everything.**

He hadn't meant for that to sound as tantalising as it did, but the Kid started typing back almost immediately. Neo half-smiled to himself. _Hook him and then reel in him…_

**Who are you?**

**Am I alone?**

The reply came to Neo immediately, but he hesitated to type it. It seemed too simple, too cliché. He couldn't imagine Morpheus or Trinity writing something that obvious. 

"Whatever," he said out loud. The truth was, he _wasn't_ Trinity or Morpheus. He was terrible at making speeches and talking to people. He could only think in clichés, and the Kid was looking for him, not Morpheus. It wouldn't be fair to make him think that Neo was some sort of philosophical genius and then meet him, only to realise that Neo was in fact a dork of the highest order.

**You are not alone,** he typed and then switched off the computer. There was nothing more to say.

**VII.******

**From death lead me to Immortality**

_Michael carried on typing. The other person, whoever it was, wasn't replying anymore; perhaps they had gone. _

**You are not alone.**

_Michael stared at the screen for a long time afterwards. He didn't know who this other person was; didn't know if they were male or female, didn't know how they'd managed to communicate with him when he hadn't even been online._

**I know it's you, Neo. I've been looking for you. Please tell me. Am I really here? Do I even exist?**

_He knew the answer to that last question, of course. Cogito ergo sum – I think therefore I am, right? It was the only clear and true certainty in the world… That and Neo existed. He had to exist; there was no way in Michael's mind that he didn't._

**It is you. I know it is.**

_How he knew that it was, he wasn't sure. But the knowledge came from that gnawing, itching feeling in his mind, the feeling that sometimes stretched down into his gut, so strong that he felt he'd been punched._

_Michael waited for that dizzying, starstruck awe to hit him; it didn't. It was as if he'd known the moment he'd switched the computer on that Neo would finally reveal himself. As if the meeting had been destined… _

_Despite his efforts, Michael had never been able to fully articulate his questions; who am I, is this real – it didn't cover the void he felt inside. But whatever the questions were, it didn't matter. He had found the answer, and it lay in the hands of a man called Neo._

_He went back to bed and dreamed of falling again. Falling into emptiness, falling into boiling seas and strange lightning struck skies. Sometimes everything was coloured as brightly as the green and red Christmas lights his mother strung around the house in December. Sometimes he fell into darkness._

_He was never afraid of hitting the ground. Neo would save him._

_Somehow, Neo would find a way._

**VIII.******

**Kansa goes bye-bye.**

"Today's the day, right?" said Link.

"Yep," said Neo, coming to stand next to Link. "Time to get him out." Link clapped his hands together and started tapping commands into the keyboard. Neo watched the Matrix code freeze and zoom in as Link keyed in the Kid's location.

"Don't go in unless you absolutely need to," said Morpheus. He and Trinity stood on Link's other side. They both looked a lot surer of Neo than Neo himself felt. "We don't want to attract any extra problems from Agents." Neo nodded. It was a simple plan: call the Kid on his cell phone, guide him to a safe point near a viable exit, talk to him, give him the pill and leave. It would be a piece of cake. Neo tried very hard not to think about the first phone call he'd had from Morpheus. That plan should have been a piece of cake, too.

"Okay," said Link, glancing up at Neo. "We're ready." He handed Neo the headphones. Neo took a deep breath and put them on, nodding for Link to make the call. He watched the screen as Kid fumbled for his phone, dropping it on the floor.

"Oh no," said Trinity. 

"What?"

"Agents," she said, pointing at the monitors.

"Shit," said Link.

"He switched it off!" Neo watched the black Sedan glide into the school driveway. "Call him again." Link started hacking, fingers flying across the keyboard as he changed the phone's code. Through the earpiece, Neo heard the phone begin to ring again. "Pick up the phone, Kid," he whispered. For a moment, the Core was silent and tense, the atmosphere broken by Neo dancing from one foot to the other. He couldn't help it.

The Agents were getting out of the car. Finally, the phone stopped ringing. There was a click and then a short exhalation of breath

"They know you know," said Neo without thinking. "They're coming for you." In the Matrix, Kid glanced out of the window. "Get out. Get out now." The phone was switched off. Neo swore and tore off the headphones, running around to the chairs. Trinity followed him.

"Neo," said Morpheus, "don't do anything unless you have to. He has to do this on his own; it's his choice what he wants."

"Right, right," said Neo, wincing slightly when Trinity slid the spike into his head. For a moment there was nothing, and then with a rush that always made him feel breathless, the Matrix unfolded around him, a forced hallucination of green code. Neo stepped outside the old phone booth he'd materialised into and headed out of the alley into the street. His cell phone rang.

"Talk to me, Link," he said as he answered the phone.

"Shit, Neo. I don't know if this Kid _needs_ your help."

"What do you mean?" Neo stopped at the street corner and looked around. From what he could remember of the reconnaissance trips he had made, the school was over five blocks away. Another black Sedan slid past him, and Neo frowned. Just how many Agents did they need to bring in one boy?

"Kid's got a skateboard. Shit, I wish I could do that…"

"What?"

"Oh, he's good-"

"Link!"

"Sorry, sorry… He's on the third floor. They've got all the exits covered…" Neo started walking again, forcing himself to keep his head down and pace steady. He wondered if Morpheus or Trinity had been this nervous trying to get him out. If they had been, they hadn't shown it. He could still remember how pissed he'd been when Morpheus had told him to climb out of the goddamn twentieth floor window and then hung up.

"Maybe you'd better get over there, Neo."

"Why?"

"Kid's just climbed out the window; he's going up the drainpipe to the roof."

"Shit, he's braver than I was…" 

"No flying, Neo! We've got enough heat without Superman saving the day too—"

"Yeah, yeah, sure," said Neo, hanging up and then racing down the street. Nothing could beat flying in the Matrix, but running came pretty close. It had the same feeling of unreality to it; like the machines had never properly worked out how it felt to run or simply forgot to program it. When he ran in the Matrix, it was easier to believe that it wasn't real; that technically, in this place, _he_ wasn't real either. Nothing but strips of code running down a battered screen.

Five blocks vanished between his feet in seconds; he was at the school entrance just in time to see the Kid on the roof, leaning backwards. Neo could make out the bright specks that were Agents but before he could process how many there were, the Kid started to fall.

A flock of crows took off from the fence as one, and Neo froze. For a moment, he felt the wind brush past his face and the Matrix was as real as his dream, as real as falling through the sky, watching his pant leg flicker in a virtual breeze. As real as trucks bearing down on a small seven year old boy. 

Neo turned away before the Kid hit the ground. He knew that he would miss the railings by inches and that there would be a brief, starry surprise of pain and then nothing. By the time the Agents had reached Kid's body, Neo was already back at the exit, picking up the phone, his mind blank and numb. The Matrix had never felt so unreal.

There was always a brief moment of shock being brought back to the real world, the colours and scent engine oil and electric boards a little overwhelming. Neo winced and sat up quickly.

"He's alive," he said, before he had even registered the others confused faces.

"Neo…" began Morpheus and then hesitated. Neo had a feeling he'd been about to say something comforting along the lines of "you did all you could". Except of course, Neo hadn't done all he could; he'd let the Kid fall.

"He's alive," he said again, getting out of the chair, looking wildly around at Trinity. Her eyebrows were knotted together.

"Neo," said Link, "we saw him hit the ground. His code…" He pointed at the screen and then shock his head. "He's dead."

"No, he's not." The others all exchanged glances. "I know he's not!" cried Neo desperately.

"How?" asked Trinity.

"I… I don't know… He—" _Because I dreamed it._"I just know it!" He looked desperately around at Morpheus.

"Is this something you've read in his code?" asked Morpheus carefully.

"Yes!" said Neo, seizing hold of this idea like a lifeline. "Yes, his code, it's different, it's not-he's not…" He trailed off, staring around at them all. "He's in the power plant. We have to get him out."

"Neo, he could be anywhere, we have no idea-"

"We have some idea," interrupted Neo. 

"Yeah," said Link with an incredulous little laugh, "we've got, what, twenty different chutes to choose from? He could come out of any of them. And if he does, it won't matter, because he's _dead_."

"No—"

"How do you know that?"

"I just know it!" Neo turned back to Morpheus. "Please Morpheus… I know he's alive, I _know_ it. I can't let him down." Morpheus stared at Neo for a long time.

"By the time we've decided which chute to pick…" he began.

"I know which one it is," said Neo, realising to his surprise that he did know. Or at least, he thought he knew… Something deep within him, in the very marrow of his bones told him that it didn't matter which one he choose; it would be the right one.

Morpheus and Trinity exchanged a long glance.

"Please, Morpheus," said Neo again. "Just run a thermal check over the pool. If it picks up nothing we can go, but if we find something…" Nobody said anything. "It's worth a chance!" cried Neo, his voice raising and echoing around the core. "If there's a chance he's alive, surely—"

"Link," said Morpheus, glancing over at the operator. Link looked incredulous.

"You can't be-"

"I am," said Morpheus. "Run a thermal."

Casting a dark look at Neo, Link scrambled up the ladder to the front of the ship.

"Neo." Trinity caught his arm. "Are you sure?" Neo nodded.

"I'm almost positive," he said, palms sweating. Trinity nodded and followed him up the ladder. Link had already fired the engines, and the hovercraft slipped up through the dark tunnels, creeping towards the surface. The pools that caught those unplugged from the Matrix were located just beneath ground level. Neo hated them; he didn't like to think what was in that water. The taste of it had seemed to cling to his tongue; even now, he sometimes felt it lingering.

"Okay," said Link, his voice tight, "which one do you want to scan first?" The holographic model flickered to life, showing seven chutes, all leading to the pool. Neo barely even paused before pointing to the one on the far left.

"That one." Link nodded and the holograph spluttered and died out as he flicked the thermal detection switch above his head.

"Anything?" asked Morpheus, seating himself in the co-pilot's chair.

"Nothing," said Link, shooting a glance at Neo.

"Do it again."

"Sir, there are sentinels not too far-"

"Link." The authority in Morpheus' voice was unavoidable. Link sighed but said nothing else. Neo tried to ignore the squirming feeling in his stomach as he glanced down at the holograph, now showing about half a dozen sentinels drifting lazily through the air. If he was wrong, they could all be killed. _How is that different to any other day?,_ he thought.

"… Christ."

"You've found something?"

Link nodded. "Chute seventeen… Something's coming down."

"Is it alive?" asked Trinity.

"It might be," said Link, sounding almost reluctant to admit it. Morpheus stared at Neo for a moment. "But sir, if we move any closer those sentinels will be over us like a bad rash."

"Link," said Morpheus slowly, looking away from Neo. "Take us in." Link swore under his breath, but took the controls. "Trinity, get to the gun turrets. Neo-"

But Neo was already fast on Trinity's heels as she slid down the ladder and onto the main deck. Neo heard her feet pounding on the metal above him as he slid down onto the bottom level of the ship, stumbling over loose wires and bolts. The belly of the ship was a little warmer than the core, but Neo barely noticed the change of temperature, his entire being focused on getting to the Kid before he drowned.

As he reached the claw (amazing really, how primitive the future could be, he thought absently) he heard a staccato burst of gunfire. He felt no fear of the sentinels at the moment; Trinity was taking care of them, and if Trinity was doing something, there was no need to be afraid. He released the claw from its harness on the wall and moved it into position over the ship's doors.

He punched in the thermal readings into the control panel and kicked the door lock open. There was a rush of cold air and the Nebuchadnezzar's search lights flickered to life. The control panel bleeped, indicating that it had locked onto the thermal source and Neo released the claw from its holdings. As it fell towards the water, Neo caught a brief glance of a flailing white body in the water. It fell still as the claw wrapped itself around it. 

Neo turned away to grab a blanket, stumbling as the ship lurched. There was another eruption of gunfire from Trinity, and then Neo stopped thinking about sentinels all together; the control panel on the wall had bleeped again and Neo punched the release. The heavy chain links rattled and clinked as they wound themselves up again. As the claw finally returned to the ship, Neo kicked the door locks shut again and just about caught the Kid under one arm as the claw released him. The boy looked much smaller and younger than sixteen… Lighter too. He shivered in the cold air.

"Neo," whispered the Kid, his eyes struggling to stay open.

"Kid." Neo wrapped the blanket around the boy and lifted him. "Don't you even think of dying, Kid. Don't you even _think_ of it."

**IX.******

**Well, he's in another world now. Make no mistake about that.**

_He was not afraid as he fell, _nor when he awoke, covered in red goo, into a nightmare._ It felt somehow familiar, as if he had always known this place, always been aware of it at the back of his mind._

_The fear only set in when he realised that he was trapped, held in place by codes and wires attached to him._

Where are you, Neo? You were supposed to catch me.

_It was very cold; he could feel it although the goo was insulating him slightly. Something huge and black filled his vision; his first impression was that of a spider, a cockroach, a creature out of childhood nightmares and B-movies. He was terrified when it grabbed him, certain that he was going to die. Strange how he only thought that now, and not when he was falling…_

How did I get here?

_Something made a whirring noise like a dentist drill and there was a strange feeling at the base of his skull. It almost felt like having a tooth removed under heavy anaesthetic, except having a tooth removed had never felt so disconnecting, as if something else – a whole lifetime – was being ripped away, too._

_He must have blacked out for a moment, because the next thing he knew he was flying through the air again, hitting the water with a tremendous splash. Michael was a good swimmer, but his limbs didn't seem to want to obey him. He floundered uselessly in the water, sinking into icy depths. He'd never been so cold._

_Something hard and sharp took hold of him and pulled him out of the water._

Neo. I knew…

_He had to tell him, had to explain. _All this was done for you, Neo. I did it, I escaped. I risked everything for the truth. All for you.

_"Neo…"_

_"Kid."__ A voice he knew as well as his own, a voice that had spoken that seemed to resonate in his head. Real. "Don't you even think of dying, Kid." He could barely see, only just making out a face creased with worry. Strong hands wrapped a blanket around him and lifted him. "Don't you even _think_ of it."_

_Michael Karl Popper passed out, knowing for the first time in his life that his reality was true._****

**X.**

**He who knows both knowledge and action**

"How did you know?" asked Trinity later. "It wasn't his code."

"No," said Neo. They stood over the Kid's unconscious body in the med bay. For a moment, Neo was silent staring down at the boy, thinking over his response in his head. "I dreamt it," he said finally, meeting her eyes. "I dreamt that I was falling… But it wasn't me. It was him." He shook his head. "I know it doesn't make any sense. I just _knew…_"

Trinity nodded slowly, her forehead furrowed in thought.

"I think I need to speak to the Oracle," said Neo, still staring at her. "I still don't understand… things." Trinity half-smiled.

"Maybe it's just enough that they happened," she said softly. "Maybe we're not meant to know why."

"I'd still like to know though," said Neo as she bent over to look at Kid's monitors.

"Me too."

Neo swallowed. "How is he?"

"His vitals are good," she said. "He's gonna make it." Typical, he thought. She always knows what I really mean. "It's unbelievable," she continued, her tone carefully guarded but he could tell she was as excited and intrigued as Morpheus had been. "I didn't think self-substantiation was possible."

"Apparently it is," said Neo.

"Neo." They both glanced down. Kid's eyes were half open, squinting in the light.

"It's okay," said Neo, heaving an inward sigh. "You're safe now." The Kid half-smiled, reminding Neo vividly of another bald frail looking boy he'd once met.

"I knew… you'd save me."

Neo bent closer, remembering how hard it had been to see anything when he'd been lying on this very table. "I didn't save you, Kid. You saved yourself."

CREDITS:

We are near awakening when we dream that we dream. -- Baron Friedrich von Hardenberg

The best way to make your dreams come true is to wake up. -- Paul Valery

From delusion lead me to Truth.

From darkness lead me to Light.

From death lead me to Immortality. 

He who knows both knowledge and action. –Neodämmerung 

Well, he's in another world now. Make no mistake about that. – taken from the Animatrix short, Kid's Story


End file.
